Ritual intent is a way of expressing the goal of the magical working, your purpose for doing the ritual. What is it that you want? Do you need some money to purchase something you've wanted for a long time? Do you wish you had a romantic relationship? Are you having nightmares and want them to stop? Those intents are quite easy to classify, money, love, sleep. Perhaps you want to quit smoking, or you have another habit you wish to be rid of. Maybe your luck just isn't good, nothing is going right lately, and you want this to change. For those you might use an exorcism spell and a protection spell. The exorcism spell to get rid of the bad habit, and a protection spell to counteract any negative influences in your life. In addition to the spells you may construct an amulet for will power to help you quit smoking, and carry a crystal for luck. Sometimes a combination of approaches works best.
A sort of shorthand has developed where ritual intent is concerned, basic categories that cover most wants, needs and desires. Most times your purpose can be broken down into one or more of a number of general goals. The tables on this site and most books on the subject of magic use these categories. Here we will briefly explain some of the terms used to describe the categories in order to make it easier for you to clairify your magical purpose.
The word exorcism conjures up images of possession from Hollywood movies, but that is not what is actually meant by the expression. Exorcism is removing an unwanted character flaw, habit or attitude. This could mean overeating, being rude to salespeople, feeling depressed, anything you wish to be rid of. Eliminating a negative influence in your life, a block that is preventing you from reaching your goals also calls for exorcism. This could be the shyness you've had since childhood, a lack of self confidence, a fondness for partying till all hours, anything that is holding you back from achieving what you want to in life. For some of these purposes you might combine exorcism with another sort of intent, such as courage, will power, happiness, or protection to further your desire.
Purification can be viewed as a less drastic exorcism in a sense. It is used for milder cases or those that are recent conditions. Mainly, though, purification is of a rather religious nature. Purifing ones body and mind of mundane, negative or counterproductive influences in order to move toward a more enlightened state. It can also mean a more physical purification, washing away the debris that collects in your aura and spirit from continuous contact with the world. Purification is cleansing, renewing, removing the extraneous.
Protection is used in a physical sense, a spirtual sense, an emotional sense, and a psychic sense. It is intended to prevent harm to you physically, such as accidents and illness, but also on a more ethereal level. A protection spell acts to turn away negative magic done by another intentionally, as well as psychic attacks either accidental or intentional. It also guards against freefloating negitivity in your immediate vicinity that might attach itself to you otherwise. Emotionally protection spells safeguard against psychological harm from situations outside your control and lessen the effects of emotional trauma.
The term fertility means more than assisting you in getting pregnant. It also refers to crops growing well, projects coming to fruition, enhancing creativity in an artistic sense and encouraging original ideas. Fertility means the growth, fulfillment or achievement of physical and creative goals and projects. It can apply to inspiration and discovery as well. Of course it can also mean having babies, puppies for your dog, kittens for your cat, calves for your cows, or any other sort of animal reproduction on a farm, ranch or kennel.
Most of the rest of the commonly used terms are self explainatory. Money, prosperity, wealth, financial gain are all used interchangably to imply an increase in cash flow and accumulation of material posessions. Healing implies recovery from illness or injury, while health implies maintaining a positive state of health both physical and mental. Mental powers includes memory, intelligence, wisdom and knowledge. Psychic powers means an improvement in intuition, and development or improvement in ESP, precognition, divinatory ability or prophetic dreams.